Amid the fallout from Chris Cairns being acquitted of perjury came the fear that, after seeing the experience of a key witness such as the New Zealand captain Brendon McCullum, cricketers will now be more reluctant to come forward with information about match-fixing.
It is a concern held by Angus Porter, the chief executive of the Professional Cricketers’ Association, who admits the process by which approaches are reported is one that “asks a lot of people and doesn’t give a huge amount back”. Lessons, he insists, must be learned from the case in the fight against corruption.
Cairns, the former New Zealand all-rounder, was found not guilty of lying under oath when he told a libel court in 2012 that he had “never” cheated at cricket. Among those to testify during the nine-week case which ended on Monday was McCullum, who told the court Cairns had approached him to fix matches in India in 2008.
McCullum underwent a tough cross-examination with the defence lawyer Orlando Pownall QC highlighting discrepancies in the three statements he gave in 2011, 2013 and 2014 before going on to claim these details changed over time to protect his own image.
The former New Zealand captain Daniel Vettori was another to be accused by the defence of not telling the truth in court.
Porter, who has played a key role in the drive to educate union members about match-fixing, admits players may be put off by the pair’s experiences. “It doesn’t encourage people to believe that if they come forward with information, they are going to have a happy experience following on from that,” he said. “We have seen how tough and challenging it can be, both in the witness box and in terms of how reputations might be affected by it. It builds on a concern that we’ve all had for some time that the process of reporting is one that asks a lot of people and doesn’t give a huge amount back. It is important people don’t feel they are going to be treated as a suspect or in some other way suffer personal damage, whether by reputation or otherwise.”
McCullum’s lawyer, Garth Gallaway, said on Tuesday his client will make no further comment on his role in the case, while the New Zealand Cricket chairman, Stuart Heal, has come out in support of his captain amid questions about the three years it took McCullum to report his evidence to the ICC.
During the trial, McCullum spoke of his regret in not speaking up sooner – the penalty for failing to disclose approaches without delay is a ban of between one and five years – and said the delay came about because he did not understand the rules at the time.
Porter believes players, in England at least, are now more clued up on what constitutes an illicit approach, with the PCA having spent the past five years educating them in response to the Essex fast bowler Mervyn Westfield becoming the first English cricketer convicted for spot-fixing in 2010. Porter said: “What would concern me would be that if a new case came along and indicated that there was a widespread issue where the evidence was the players didn’t understand what they were supposed to do or what their responsibilities were in that scenario.”
“Players, by and large, are much more certain of their responsibilities and we should feel, without being complacent, at least confident that people understand what they need to do.”
The ICC’s anti-corruption unit did not emerge from the case in the best light. The court heard the investigator John Rhodes had lost his diary for 2011 and, when speaking to another former cricketer about rumours surrounding his involvement, the official opted not to take notes of the conversation because it was “not of any significance”.
Porter said: “Anything that suggests information was not dealt with as well as it could have been has to be a concern. But rather than looking for someone to blame, it’s important we look at it objectively and work out what lessons can be taken from it.
“We must make sure we create an environment where confidentiality is respected in so far as it can be, and players receive the right treatment and support when they do come forward.”
